The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : From Big Bang to the present

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Mar 03, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

From Big Bang to the present

Staff Reporter

Balaji Sampath's booklet titled `Story of Everything' released

CHENNAI : Long, long ago, 1,500 crore years ago to be precise, the universe came into being. The story of what followed till the earth was born kept more than 200 children from schools in the city spellbound at the Khadi Auditorium here on Wednesday.

The occasion was the release of a multi-coloured booklet titled `Story of Everything' (`Ulagam Uruvana Kadhai' in Tamil) by Balaji Sampath of AID-India. The story of the universe, starring galaxies, fusing nuclei and incredible swathes of time, will now be taken to 1,500 villages across the State by the organisation.

"Taking the basic principles of the science to all is our aim," said A. Ravishankar, joint secretary, AID-India.

He urged science teachers to initiate a dialogue, before explaining any scientific principles, to clear popular misconceptions that children might believe to be true. Science subjects were divided into the watertight compartments of physics, biology and chemistry. Teachers must try to highlight the connections, he said.

"February 28 has been called National Science Day because it was the day on Sir C.V. Raman first announced the Nobel-prize winning Raman Effect to the world," said T.S. Natarajan, IIT Madras. He told students that they should continually ask questions and experiment to keep scientific temper alive.

Dr. Sampath then narrated the tale told in his book. "Carbon atoms, the basis of all living things, were born when the first generation of stars in the universe died. That makes us all superstars," he quipped.

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